War Music: Homer and His Iliad(literaryreview.co.uk)
literaryreview.co.uk
War Music: Homer and His Iliad
https://literaryreview.co.uk/war-music
32 comments
Who's Achilles looking at in this passage?
The scene: Achilles, having just about finished mourning Patroclus, and having agreed to fight once again on behalf of the Achaeans, wakes alone on the morning of battle.
I'll give you the pages just before and after that part. Here: https://docdro.id/puR412w
I'll give you the pages just before and after that part. Here: https://docdro.id/puR412w
Thanks! I'll be reading it and the other links in this thread while I wait for my copy in the mail.
> Homer had visited windy Troy on a clear day when distant Samothrace was visible … I like to think he had walked south, like Chryses, beside the shore of the booming sea
This passage sounds a lot like the writing style of the ancient classics. I assume the reviewer chose it on purpose for that reason. I don't know that I need to read this book, but I appreciate that apparently it's a work of passion and enthusiasm.
This passage sounds a lot like the writing style of the ancient classics. I assume the reviewer chose it on purpose for that reason. I don't know that I need to read this book, but I appreciate that apparently it's a work of passion and enthusiasm.
Thankfully the original work is now out of copyright, and there is an English translation here: https://www.poetryintranslation.com/PITBR/Greek/Ilhome.php
> Thankfully the original work is now out of copyright
Seeing someone explicitly assert the copyright status of a text pushing 3 millennia old is somehow very amusing to me
Seeing someone explicitly assert the copyright status of a text pushing 3 millennia old is somehow very amusing to me
I was talking about the book being reviewed, which seems to be an analysis of the Iliad by Robin Lane Fox, rather than the Iliad itself.
Title reminds me of this true masterpiece:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qI0mkt6Z3I0
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qI0mkt6Z3I0
One of my coworkers went to Reed where they insisted on students reading the Lattimore translation of the Iliad, so I gave it a try as well. Once I got over the weirdness of the pseudo-Greek language I really liked it. Now it sounds like I should maybe give Logue a try, even though I've been declaring that Lattimore is the only true translation (never having read any other ones).
Wait for Emily Wilson (due at the end of September). Her Odyssey is easily among the great classical translations.
The book's author, Robin Lane Fox, is father of Martha Lane Fox [1], co-founder of LastMinute.com
[1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martha_Lane_Fox
[1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martha_Lane_Fox
I can warmly recommend the new Iliad translation by Caroline Alexander as audiobook. Suberb! I understand the new translation by Emily Wilson (whose Odyssey was excellent) should be good as well.
The new translations really bring these old poems to life, and listening to them is at least for me the best way to consume them.
The new translations really bring these old poems to life, and listening to them is at least for me the best way to consume them.
I disagree about Emily Wilson's Odissey. She translated the first line of the poem as "Tell me about a complicated man". She almost went with "Tell me about a straying husband". Neither complicated nor straying husband appear in the original text. Pope's description (The man for wisdom’s various arts renown’d...) is closer to the epithets we are taught at school (ricco d'astuzie or dal multiforme ingegno). πολύτροπος means resourceful, of many skills, well-travelled.
That's the first line and complicated tells us nothing about the protagonist. Everyone can be complicated, but only Odysseus is πολύτροπον. It's a quality of character few people possess.
Original comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25525457#25531307
That's the first line and complicated tells us nothing about the protagonist. Everyone can be complicated, but only Odysseus is πολύτροπον. It's a quality of character few people possess.
Original comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25525457#25531307
Wilson discusses her choices in the translation of that first line in great detail in this interview for the New York Times: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/11/02/magazine/the-first-woman-...
You're welcome to disagree, but I find her choices fascinating, and I loved her translation. (I read the Fagles translation in school and liked that one as well.)
You're welcome to disagree, but I find her choices fascinating, and I loved her translation. (I read the Fagles translation in school and liked that one as well.)
Wilson's Twitter threads on how she decided to translate certain words, lines, passages, etc. were absolutely brilliant, really getting to the heart of what makes translation so subjective.
That said, I disagreed with lots of her choices. Odysseus' "I could not do my exercise routine" (8.232) is a particularly egregious rendition of a line in Greek that says nothing more than "There were not sufficient supplies on the ship". There are many other examples.
That said, I disagreed with lots of her choices. Odysseus' "I could not do my exercise routine" (8.232) is a particularly egregious rendition of a line in Greek that says nothing more than "There were not sufficient supplies on the ship". There are many other examples.
This complaint seems odd. First complicated is obviously not in the original text, it's in Greek. I guess what you mean is "No words I would translate as complicated are in the text" but then your complaint just becomes a tautology. Saying Pope's version from the 1700s is more like what you were taught in school is similar, it's probably the version you or your teachers read so it shaped what you were taught. Essentially this comes down to saying it's different, but that doesn't make it bad.
>This complaint seems odd. First complicated is obviously not in the original text, it's in Greek. I guess what you mean is "No words I would translate as complicated are in the text" but then your complaint just becomes a tautology.
The parent's complaint is neither a tautology not odd in any way.
"Neither complicated nor straying husband appear in the original text" obviousy means "the meanings conveyed by those words are not the meanings found in the original text", not that the English words aren't in the original (I mean, duh!).
They translator is bizarrely translating a word that means "resourceful" to "complicated".
It's about Ulysses being like MacGyver, not like Dan Draper. It'anymore that Greek for fish ("ichthus") would make sense to translate as "
The parent's complaint is neither a tautology not odd in any way.
"Neither complicated nor straying husband appear in the original text" obviousy means "the meanings conveyed by those words are not the meanings found in the original text", not that the English words aren't in the original (I mean, duh!).
They translator is bizarrely translating a word that means "resourceful" to "complicated".
It's about Ulysses being like MacGyver, not like Dan Draper. It'anymore that Greek for fish ("ichthus") would make sense to translate as "
It's not really a matter of opinion when everything is lost in translation. I know it can be hard to understand without a basic intro to ancient Greek, but it's like translating a reference to the "Titanic" with "some boat, I dunno".
The complaint - which I definetely share by the way - is that for all the critical acclaim it got, Emily Wilson's translation strays so far from the actual text, it is not really a translation anymore and is actually closer to being a new text inspired by the Odyssey. That's fine if that's what you are looking for but it doesn't make for a great translation.
The πολύτροπος thing is a complete red herring by the way. Her translation is questionnable but remains within the bound of what I would expect from a modern translator. I am more annoyed by everything she drops in the rest of the poem. Remarkably and annoyingly, the coverage when her translation was released spend far more time dwelling on her gender than on her actual work.
The πολύτροπος thing is a complete red herring by the way. Her translation is questionnable but remains within the bound of what I would expect from a modern translator. I am more annoyed by everything she drops in the rest of the poem. Remarkably and annoyingly, the coverage when her translation was released spend far more time dwelling on her gender than on her actual work.
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I am not hand waving it. This line was commented ad nauseam when the book was released and is the one people who have no idea of neither what in the Greek text nor what’s in the translation like to discuss. As it’s far from being the most questionable part of the translation, I don’t see the point of centring discussion on it, especially when you consider it’s not an awful translation of the original. It’s not very close but you can find far worse later.
C’mon, Pope clearly has the worst parse of πολύτροπος which I will remind you is “many paths”, Wilson takes this as a metaphor internal and external, many roads traveled, many roads within, not perfect, but it’s good. And Pope reads it like who he is, a Latinate schoolboy, and it’s beautiful but he carries so much of himself into that line.
In one reading, πολύτροπος is turn in the Odyssey away from past stories, Odysseus as psychological composite, the previous song in the cycle is about μῆνιν and its manifestation as the hero Achilles, the traditional, singular hero.
If you want to see this shift between the composite and the singular in poetics discussed, read Aristophanes’ Frogs.
In one reading, πολύτροπος is turn in the Odyssey away from past stories, Odysseus as psychological composite, the previous song in the cycle is about μῆνιν and its manifestation as the hero Achilles, the traditional, singular hero.
If you want to see this shift between the composite and the singular in poetics discussed, read Aristophanes’ Frogs.
These were my first encounters with the stories first hand, and loved them.
I suppose it’s a matter of taste.
We’ve never been through classic texts at school, I think it’s a cultural thing if they are fundamental enough to be taught at school or not.
Probably depends a lot with what expectations you come to the poem. My expectation was that it would be a struggle, but was captivated from the start.
I’ve looked some older translations in english and the ’old style’ verses have been complete turn-offs. The ’simplified’ or more dynamic translations were what made them work for me.
And it’s not the specific turns of phrazes that matter as much as the whole. The stories of both Iliad and Odyssey totally kick ass, and are amazing portals to bronze age life.
I suppose it’s a matter of taste.
We’ve never been through classic texts at school, I think it’s a cultural thing if they are fundamental enough to be taught at school or not.
Probably depends a lot with what expectations you come to the poem. My expectation was that it would be a struggle, but was captivated from the start.
I’ve looked some older translations in english and the ’old style’ verses have been complete turn-offs. The ’simplified’ or more dynamic translations were what made them work for me.
And it’s not the specific turns of phrazes that matter as much as the whole. The stories of both Iliad and Odyssey totally kick ass, and are amazing portals to bronze age life.
These are good, but to really bring them to life I recommend Christopher Logue, whose version doesn't even pretend to be a translation. There are some nice excerpts in his obituary in The Economist https://archive.ph/eaCKf
I heartily recommend Logue's adaptation too! I'm not a regular poetry reader, nor a reader of the classics but his version really opened my mind to those worlds. I enjoy writers like Samuel Beckett and the weirder, darker end of sci-fi/fantasy (e.g. B. Catling's The Voorh), and Logue's War Music really just seemed to fit right into my taste.
Came here to recommend this. You can find a longer excerpt here: https://www.uvm.edu/~jbailly/courses/HomerTranslation/LogueW...
Oh, brilliant, I definetly need to get a hold of Logues translation. Thanks!
Thanks for the recommendations, fsloth.
For anyone interested in this, I found a couple of excerpts of Caroline Alexander's Iliad translation[0] that were published in The Guardian as well as an article by Emily Wilson (the Odyssey translator also mentioned above) about the engagement of female scholars and translators with the classics[1].
[0] https://www.theguardian.com/books/2016/feb/09/new-translatio...
[1] https://www.theguardian.com/books/2017/jul/07/women-classics...
For anyone interested in this, I found a couple of excerpts of Caroline Alexander's Iliad translation[0] that were published in The Guardian as well as an article by Emily Wilson (the Odyssey translator also mentioned above) about the engagement of female scholars and translators with the classics[1].
[0] https://www.theguardian.com/books/2016/feb/09/new-translatio...
[1] https://www.theguardian.com/books/2017/jul/07/women-classics...
[deleted]
If I understand correctly, I am writing a review of a review of a book about the Iliad.
But we can only read so many books. If we had to choose, would we just read a translation of the original Iliad instead of a book about it? This is why we should be thankful for a physical bookshelf, it allows us to skip these steps and just pick up the book.
I don't think we need to be too concerned with the particular translation of the Iliad, I think the older the better as long as one can still properly read it. I think a certain amount of reading into the poem is required regardless.
To be more precise, this book would do all of the reading into the poem that I want to do. I want to read into it myself and draw my own conclusions! (To the extent that it's possible).
But we can only read so many books. If we had to choose, would we just read a translation of the original Iliad instead of a book about it? This is why we should be thankful for a physical bookshelf, it allows us to skip these steps and just pick up the book.
I don't think we need to be too concerned with the particular translation of the Iliad, I think the older the better as long as one can still properly read it. I think a certain amount of reading into the poem is required regardless.
To be more precise, this book would do all of the reading into the poem that I want to do. I want to read into it myself and draw my own conclusions! (To the extent that it's possible).
I don't think there's anything wrong with people writing down their own thoughts about great works of literature like the Iliad. What I really do appreciate are the people who review such writings-down so that I can make an informed decision about whether their thoughts are worth my time to read.
In this case, I imagine that any book analyzing the Iliad is intended for readers who have already themselves read the Iliad at least once.
In this case, I imagine that any book analyzing the Iliad is intended for readers who have already themselves read the Iliad at least once.
It is without doubt one of the best poetic works of the past 100 years.
"Achilles saw his armour in that instant
And its ominous radiance flooded his heart.
Bright pads with toggles crossed behind the knees,
Bodice of fitted tungsten, pliable straps;
His shield as round and rich as moons in spring;
His sword's haft parked between sheaves of grey obsidian
From which a lucid blade stood out, leaf-shaped, adorned
With running spirals.
And for his head a welded cortex; yes,
Though it is noon, the helmet screams against the light;
Scratches the eye; so violent it can be seen
Across three thousand years."
The Caroline Alexander translation is much more "correct," but lacks Logue's spark of vitality and originality.